Highlight: Will The Church "Lose" in History?

Apologia Studios

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:00

Oh, guess what? We don't win down here.

00:07

We lose. You ready for that? Oh, you were a post -millennialist.

00:14

You thought we were just going to go waltzing into the kingdom as we took over the world. No. We lose here.

00:20

Get it? They killed Jesus. They killed all the apostles. We're all going to be persecuted.

00:26

If any man come after me, let him, but not himself.

00:36

Okay, so first of all, correction to Brother MacArthur, a humble correction because I love this man very much.

00:43

A humble correction is post -millennialists don't believe that. No post -millennialist believes that.

00:48

That we go waltzing into the kingdom. Has taught that. Nobody. And I've read a significant number of books by post -millennialists.

00:57

I've read a significant number of statements dating all the way back to Athanasius, the patron saint of post -millennialism.

01:05

And no post -millennialist believes that we go waltzing into the kingdom. That is a caricature of post -millennialists.

01:14

We do not believe that at all. But here is Dr. MacArthur saying we lose down here.

01:20

We lose down here. Get that through your heads. We lose down here.

01:26

And to that, I would say there's a number of ways to refute that. But how about the meek shall inherit the earth? How about Romans 5,

01:33

Abraham's descendants would inherit the... Romans 4, Abraham's descendants would inherit the world. It's clear in scripture that it's the meek that inherit the earth and Abraham's descendants that inherit the world.

01:46

And it's very different from this idea of losing down here. And so again, we could do a whole episode responding, showing all the passages of the promise of victory in the world.

01:57

We've already touched on some of them. We could do Isaiah 2. We could do Isaiah 9, Isaiah 11. You could do

02:02

Daniel 7, 13 through 14. You could do Isaiah 42. We could go, again, for days on this to show that is actually not what scripture says that we lose down here.

02:11

It says the opposite, actually. Is there persecution in the first century for the church? Absolutely.

02:16

That's the inception of the church. Is there gonna be persecution as we bring the gospel into hard places and bring it into conflict with idolatry and paganism?

02:23

Absolutely. Christians are still gonna die as we proclaim the gospel and grow in his kingdom, expands and grows around the world.

02:31

However, according to scripture, Jesus wins down here. And on that one significant point, they killed

02:40

Jesus. Don't you know we don't win down here? That's how Jesus won. Right. Okay.

02:47

That's it. Yeah. They killed him. Yeah, they killed him. And also there's not just the fact that he won in his death, but that he won in his resurrection.

02:57

Jesus didn't stay dead. He's alive. And more than just being alive from the dead,

03:02

Jesus actually ascended and was seated on the messianic throne. So yeah, he died and he won there.

03:09

And then won again with his resurrection and won again with his ascension and won again with being seated on his throne.

03:15

And now he is the ruler of everything, the ruler of the kings of the earth today and has all authority in heaven and on earth today.

03:22

So the point in playing that, and we're gonna continue this discussion because it's a good one to have. We need to be having it. The point of that is to actually demonstrate, no, actually there are elements to eschatological beliefs that do tend towards a loser theology that we lose down here.

03:41

And you've got one of my very favorites, Dr. MacArthur saying that right there. I mean, guys, how many times do we need to hear people saying things like why bother polishing brass on the sinking ship and all of that?

03:52

Because that's the portrait. If we lose down here, then we act like it.

03:58

That's if you tell people we lose down here, then they will act like it. And so what we're saying here is that there is a fundamental conflict between what

04:09

Dr. MacArthur says here in terms of the authority of Christ and King of Kings and Lord of Lords and Scott and Virgil and Josh, in terms of the full authority of Jesus, he is, they would say he is reigning now.

04:24

He is the King of Kings now. And then what they say about the implications of that in this life now, there's a conflict.

04:30

It's really, really important. Really quick, we don't win down here, we lose.

04:36

Okay, that's one side. And then in the podcast that we're reviewing right now, Scott says, be faithful.

04:44

Ordinary Christian faithfulness, moms. Ordinary Christian faithfulness, businessmen. Whatever your vocation, whatever you're calling, whatever you're doing, you have no idea what that produces.

04:56

Well, we were just told on one hand that it doesn't mean anything because we don't win down here, we lose. And in what sense does that carry over to victory if we don't win down here, but go be faithful, go preach, go live, go conduct business, go teach, go raise a family.

05:18

Why? We don't win. Yeah, we lose. That has to mean something. And I think their response of course would be, well, it's the ultimate victory, right?

05:27

It's eternal victory. Jesus wins in the end, right? Whereas our position would be, yeah, and amen, but there's also this historical mop -up project that he's intimately involved in.